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4.06 AVERAGE
4.06 AVERAGE
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
slow-paced
An amazing book. An amazing book that took me six months to wade through because it's incredibly boring as well as incredibly written. There is so much to think about in this book, but it's deceptive, because there's also nothing really happening.
If you read this: be forewarned. For six hundred pages, nothing really happens. But at the same time it's so evocative, so pretty, so packed with the way things are sometimes. This book drove me out of my mind, but at the same time I loved it.
If you read this: be forewarned. For six hundred pages, nothing really happens. But at the same time it's so evocative, so pretty, so packed with the way things are sometimes. This book drove me out of my mind, but at the same time I loved it.
read the first part ("Overture"). i still want to read the rest, but it's not exactly suited to a library loan and after a bit of research i have decided to try a different translation
"That must be delightful," sighed my grandfather, in whose mind nature had unfortunately forgotten to include any capacity whatsoever for becoming passionately interested in the co-operative movement among the ladies of Sweden or in the methods employed by Maubant to get up his parts, just as it had forgotten to endow my grandmother's two sisters with a grain of that precious salt which one has oneself to 'add to taste' in order to extract any savour from a narrative of the private life of Molé or of the Comte de Paris.
emotional
reflective
Proust’s ability to make descriptions of his past seem ethereal yet grounded, palpable yet fleeting, along with powerful storytelling detailing the acute absurdity of being in love, make this a worthwhile read despite the author’s affinity for run-on sentences.
“Combray” dragged on for thrice as long as it could have but otherwise, this is a brilliant and philosophically adept novel. I am now headed to the bakery to pick up some madeleines then on to the florist for a bouquet of chrysanthemums. A Prost for Proust!
I’ve had this book for many years and have only touched it while packing and unpacking when moving and then when I over-optimistically brought it with me upstate in the early Covid lockdown days. Once again with optimism, it joined me back in Brooklyn as the one book I hadn’t read, and since I didn’t buy many new books this year, it seemed like the time to finally read it.
I’m glad to have finally experienced this novel, though I could have been happy just reading the first two Combray sections, which include the madeleines episode as well as many evocative recollections of the narrator’s experience of country life. The character Swann is only mentioned in passing in these first sections — his “way” refers to one of the walking paths the family often takes — but the next section jolts to Paris and covers Swann’s romance with a likely courtesan, which I found tiresome over time. The final, short section has the narrator back in Paris years later, becoming obsessed with Swann’s daughter, which was similarly tiresome. Arguably the last two sections are a bit more plot-driven and internal in a more anxious manner, so perhaps I like Proust better when less is happening and the narrator’s thoughts are more relaxed. Skimming through the synopsis of the entire Recherche, it seems like the Combray sections are possibly unique in their reflective quality.
I’m glad to have finally experienced this novel, though I could have been happy just reading the first two Combray sections, which include the madeleines episode as well as many evocative recollections of the narrator’s experience of country life. The character Swann is only mentioned in passing in these first sections — his “way” refers to one of the walking paths the family often takes — but the next section jolts to Paris and covers Swann’s romance with a likely courtesan, which I found tiresome over time. The final, short section has the narrator back in Paris years later, becoming obsessed with Swann’s daughter, which was similarly tiresome. Arguably the last two sections are a bit more plot-driven and internal in a more anxious manner, so perhaps I like Proust better when less is happening and the narrator’s thoughts are more relaxed. Skimming through the synopsis of the entire Recherche, it seems like the Combray sections are possibly unique in their reflective quality.
I got used to the long sentences after a while, and did find some observations and sentences pretty inciteful about memory, experience etc., but on the whole I found this very, very boring.